You do know that photographs in fashion mags are heavily altered before publication, right? I always assume that this is common knowledge, but I wasn’t aware of how heavily modified some images are until I checked out some before and after comparisons (click on ‘portfolio’). Looking at those images was quite eye opening, as I suddenly realized that all of the porcelain dolls I see on magazine covers have skin that’s actually a lot like mine, with small blemishes and natural imperfections. And that even “perfect” actresses and models are altered before being placed in the public eye.

I find that pretty depressing, myself. We constantly rail on about the unrealistic beauty standard promoted by the fashion industry, but it’s kind of a shock to be actually confronted with it. Of course, I knew that image manipulation happens, but I don’t think I realized the extent of such manipulation. It certainly didn’t occur to me that even for the perfect, there is no perfection, thanks to this crazy society we live in.

Yesterday, this article was published in the Telegraph, and the fatosphere started responding, along with feminist bloggers. For those of you who don’t feel inclined to read the article, the short version is that many fashion magazines are starting to alter images of models and actresses to make them seem less thin. And I stress “less thin,” although the Telegraph opted for “fatter,” because these women aren’t fat, they are still thin. Very, very thin.

My response to the article was mixed. On the one hand, I thought it was interesting that magazines are actually altering images to make their subjects look larger, although still nowhere close to real women. On the other hand, it depressed me to think that these magazines have chosen to cover up the real consequences of dangerous thinness, probably in response to rising public outcry about the issue, and to make them seem more attractive.

As Ann says in the post at Feministing, if you want pictures of healthy models, hire healthy models, rather than modifying photographs of unhealthy models to make them look healthier. This seems pretty straightforward to me. She also made a very good point when she discussed the fact that extremely thin women don’t actually look that attractive, what with tiny breasts and bottoms, and jutting bones, so altering their images encourages people to pursue a thin look without revealing the physical cost.

Image manipulation of this type is simply a clear, blatant, lie. It conceals an important reality: the fact that anoretics have sallow, nasty skin, ashy hair, jutting bones, and a variety of other grotesque symptoms. The reality is that if you want to be as thin as the people in magazines, you’re going to look awful, but you might not realize that, since the truth is concealed from you.

The fashion industry is brutal for people on the inside, and pretty awful for those of us on the outside who are still influenced by it. I’m not sure what kind of message photoshopping to add flesh might be sending, but I don’t think it’s good, and I would love to see even one fashion magazine use honest, unaltered images straight from the camera. Just for once, it would be nice to see the truth, rather than an elaborately constructed fiction.

There seems to be growing awareness that maybe being extremely thin is dangerous, and some action is even being taken, like banning anorexic fashion models from fashion shows. Yet, at the same time, I see casual references to the “obesity epidemic” everywhere I look. I wonder if anyone’s left in the middle anymore, when a size eight is fat, all the models are all under size zero, and even they aren’t perfect enough for the exacting standards of the fashion industry.

One Saturday in the fall at my first college, I was feeling a bit down in the dumps, and a friend of mine turned to me and said “let’s go to Brattleboro and get some crispy tofu,” and we did, three of us in her big purple Subaru. It turns out that Brattleboro happened to have a very good Vietnamese restaurant at the time (and maybe they still do), and the tradition of going out for crispy tofu when feeling blue had begun several semesters before.

So we ate our crispy tofu and spring rolls, and then we wondered around Brattleboro in the warmth of early fall, going to bookstores and the Brattleboro Food Co-op, and then one friend remembered that she actually needed something from the outdoor store, so we went there, and while we were there, I purchased a Nalgene bottle.

This may not seem like a big event in a person’s life, I mean lots of people have water bottles and a fair number of those water bottles are Nalgene bottles, but Nalgene had just come out with the line of brightly colored ones, as I recall, and it was a topic of much debate, which color I should get, and then someone else got one too. I also got a tin of Burt’s Bees Chapstick, as I recall, and even now, the smell of Burt’s Bees transports me back to Vermont in the winter, with snow and cracking lips and long silences.

I’ve been using that bottle ever since.

I missed the bottled water craze because of my Nalgene. Why buy bottled water when I already had a bottle of perfectly palatable water, ready to hand? I never got the point of bottled water, and was kind of surprised when it became hip and trendy.

The printed volume measurements on the side wore off long ago, and at one point the cap became so damaged that it couldn’t close anymore, so I was forced to replace it. On the side of the water bottle, I typed a helpful typewritten reminder: If love is free, why so sad? The tape has endured through years of use and multiple dishwashings, as has the paper itself. I’m kind of surprised it hasn’t disintegrated, thanks to the humidity.

I’ve taken my Nalgene camping in all sorts of strange places. I’ve accidentally left it clipped to my pack and watched my bag skid across 150 feet of tarmac at an airport after being misthrown, leaving one small scratch on the bottle. It’s been carried on hikes, refilled from mountain streams, frozen, and run through a garbage disposal by accident (there’s a small scratch on the bottom).

When I had real jobs where I went to work somewhere, my Nalgene always came with me, and people could tell when I was working because they would see it perched on the counter, or near my workstation. I drank from it in nervous, sudden gulps when I was stressed out or upset, I used it as a handy gauge to see how much water I drank a day, I threw it at someone in a fit of rage one when I was breaking up with him and split his eyebrow on it.

My Nalgene and I have been through the wringer. That water bottle has more frequent flier miles than most people I know, and it’s been present through thick and thin. It might seem silly to think of having such an intense and personal relationship with an object, but there it is. That bottle has been a part of my life for so long that I’ve forgotten what it would be like to live without it.

Looking at my Nalgene reminds me of so many events, places, people, and relationships. There’s a lot of memory packed into that humble water bottle, and sometimes it’s almost too much to bear. I’m sometimes reminded of the scene in Stranger in a Strange Land where Michael looks down at a city and sees it as “so choked with living experience.” I have always suspected that places and some objects can become almost overloaded with memories and experiences, personally.

I think it’s safe to say that my Nalgene is one of my oldest friends, and that’s why I was sad to learn that the plastic it is made from is apparently toxic. People have had their suspicions about BPA for years, but I guess it’s official now. The Canadian government even says ixnay on the pabnay. Nalgene has stopped making bottles with BPA, mainly in response to consumer concerns, I suspect, and some stores have pulled products which contain it.

I suppose I should retire my Nalgene, given this information, but I can’t bring myself to do it. After all, I live a block away from a hazardous waste dump, and I lived on a hazardous materials site for almost a year. Lots of things around me are probably cancerous, including a number of former friendships. So I’m just not ready to drain my Nalgene and recycle it. It seems so cold and callous to dump my old friend like that, just because of the latest health scare, the latest political trend in the health conscious community. Maybe I will be ready, someday, but for now I know that it will always be there in the fridge waiting for me, filled with cold water, and I like something fixed and dependable in my life.

Sometimes, my posts about irritation with modern society just write themselves, and this was definitely the case when I encountered this Newsweek article about a children’s book explaining plastic surgery. It’s called “My Beautiful Mommy,” and it kind of makes me want to vomit.

Ostensibly, the book is designed to be marketed to mothers who are considering plastic surgery and want to be able to explain what’s happening to their young children. I get that. I can imagine it would be weird when your parents undergo medical procedures and don’t explain it, and it can be scary, so being able to talk about it would probably be really beneficial for young children, taking the fear of the unknown out of the equation.

But has plastic surgery for mothers become so commonplace that we need a children’s book to explain it? The outrageometer says yes, because obviously mothers have gross, disgusting, nasty sagging tummies and breasts, and no one will ever love them unless they resort to dangerous invasive surgical procedures to make them smooth, firm, and tight again.

I’ve noticed that mothers seem to be in for it more and more these days. First, they’re expected to lose their baby weight post haste, because baby weight makes you FAT and no one wants to look at fat people, even if they did just grow a human being. And now, apparently, mothers are supposed to surgically correct the somewhat inevitable results of pregnancy, thereby even further disguising the evidence that they gave birth to children.

Now, I don’t have children, so maybe I’m missing something here, but I feel like parenthood is a source of pride and personal identity for many people. So why would you want to conceal the fact that you are a parent? And why would you want a partner who erases all evidence of having born children, despite the fact that the children are (presumably) still in your lives?

A friend of mine once told me that he always thinks that women who haven’t had children look incomplete or unfinished somehow. He didn’t mean it in an insulting way (really), and he made a valid point; hormonal changes during pregnancy do change your body in certain ways, and some of those changes endure. From an evolutionary standpoint, it would make sense to be attracted to women who exhibit characteristics associated with pregnancy, because it means that they are fertile, which makes it kind of doubly sad that mothers now apparently feel like they need to cover up the evidence when they have children.

I’m opposed to plastic surgery in general, except in the case of reconstructive surgery after serious injuries or accidents, or in the case of surgery to correct congenital birth defects which cause pain or extreme embarrassment, or hinder someone’s ability to live. By all means, fix cleft palates and give burn victims new skin, but why hack the bodies of healthy people to satisfy some insane beauty standard?

Not having been pregnant, I don’t know what it’s like to experience the physical and hormonal changes associated with pregnancy and its aftermath. And I can definitely understand a sense of frustration or unhappiness with one’s body after pregnancy, because it has undergone some major changes. But I feel like it’s something that people should ride out, rather than correcting surgically. I know lots of mothers with washboard abs and firm, high breasts who came by them naturally, illustrating that it is, in fact, possible to tone your body back into shape after pregnancy, if that’s what you want to do.

It makes me incredibly sad that our solution to the complex emotions which women experience after surgery is to sweep them under the rug, to hack their bodies apart so they look “normal again.” What kind of society do we live in?

There’s an article up on the BBC which actually made me feel lightly ill.

It’s about winning the lottery in Oregon.

The healthcare lottery, that is. Apparently Oregon has decided to address the issue of healthcare for low income individuals by creating a lottery system, with lucky winners who receive healthcare. The losers, apparently, buy tickets…er…apply…again next month. The timing of this article is especially interesting to me because I’ve just been thinking (again) about the need for universal single-payer healthcare.

The thought that people should get healthcare coverage through a lottery system is just obscene, and I’m sure that European readers must find the article a bit perplexing. There are a lot of misconceptions about the American healthcare system in Europe, and articles like this only cement those misconceptions, while also pointing out the serious problems with America’s approach to healthcare.

The thing about universal single-payer healthcare is that it’s just straight up cheaper to run than this asinine system we have going now. By covering everyone, the government would encourage a culture of preventative care, and it could negotiate better costs with drug companies and healthcare providers. In many parts of Europe, doctors make quite respectable salaries, and they get bonuses for keeping their patients healthier, in a system which encourages a strong relationship between patients and doctors while promoting a generally higher standard of health. Meanwhile, Europeans in general appear healthier than Americans, accounting for less missed days of work and creating a more vibrant, productive society. The EU, my friends, is kicking our butts.

I’ve read several critiques by American doctors who find the thought of universal single-payer repugnant, arguing that it is nothing more than rank socialism. And it is, but that’s the beauty of it. Socialized medicine is vastly better than entering a lottery in the hopes that you can get healthcare coverage. It’s better than a system where people overload emergency rooms with petty complaints because they don’t have regular doctors. It’s better than a system where scads of independent contractors (like me) gamble that they won’t have major health problems, because they can’t afford health insurance. I hear Clinton wants to cap health insurance costs at 10% of people’s incomes. That would be great, if I could spare 10% of my income for health costs. But I can’t, and neither can most middle and lower class Americans.

A lot of Americans don’t seem to understand that the healthcare system is broken, yet fixable, with some effort. I can’t help but think that people are kept in deliberate ignorance in the hopes that insurance companies can continue to profit, because anyone with half a brain ought to be able to see that this system is not working. People should not be afraid to go to the doctor because they can’t afford it. They shouldn’t be afraid to embark on a course of medical treatment which might change their lives because they can’t afford it. People in this country should not be dying from lack of healthcare. It’s just not…well, honestly, it’s just not American, darnit. This is the country where people are supposed to be neighborly, looking out for each other and lending a hand where it’s needed, not a country where people let their teeth rot in their heads because they can’t afford a dentist. It shouldn’t be a country where people rely on games of chance for medical treatment.

Europeans get cradle to grave care, so clearly it’s not impossible…so why are we having such a hard time figuring our scene out?

One of the things they did during the “downtown revitalization” which involved ripping out half of Franklin Street was install crosswalks and sidewalks which are supposed to be more wheelchair friendly, along with textured material at street corners and driveways to alert the blind to changes in elevation (and the fact that they are about to walk out into the street). I happen to think that these modifications are awesome, because I am all for making spaces more friendly to the disabled.

However, it is sort of funny that while people in wheelchairs can now navigate Franklin Street, they still can’t enter a surprising number of the businesses on the street. In the rare cases of businesses which a wheelchair can get into, the stores themselves are usually not very wheelchair accessible (one notable exception to this is Racines, which has a very clear, open floorplan which makes it pretty easy to navigate in a wheelchair, although some of the corners of the store are a bit tight).A friend on mine in a wheelchair has often pointed this problem out.

“It’s one thing to be able to get into the store,” she says, “but usually I get inside and then can’t move, because the aisles are insanely narrow and cluttered with crap. So either I can’t fit down the aisle, or I can just squeeze in, but I am terrified of knocking stuff down, and most of the stuff is displayed out of reach, so I have to call a rude, surly employee over and beg them to get things for me. That’s why I shop online.”

When I was at the Botanical Gardens on Saturday, I found myself thinking about this issue, because I noted that wheelchair users really wouldn’t be able to see most of the gardens. And it really made me wonder how it is that almost 20 years after the passage of the Americans With Disabilities Act, many businesses are still not friendly to the disabled.

Look, this isn’t a politically correct thing. This is a cold, hard business concern. Back in my days as a retail whore, I made a conscious effort to recommend businesses which are handicapped accessible, not only to parties with obviously disabled members, but to everyone, because I think that these businesses demonstrate a genuine desire to reach out to customers. I also find that the staff at places like that tend to be more friendly, patient, understanding, and helpful, and those are all traits which I feel are worthy of promotion.

Especially since everyone here is all like “rah rah tourism!” It amuses me that business owners apparently think it is perfectly acceptable to write off the elderly and disabled as potential revenue sources. Especially since we have a growing population of elderly in this country, and we’ve got a fair number of disabled veterans returning from Iraq. Thanks for serving, hope you didn’t want to be able to buy underwear!

By excluding the handicapped from their businesses, people miss out on a lot of potential sales, and they frustrate a huge segment of potential customers. If you have stairs at your doorway instead of a ramp, right there you’re cutting customers off. And disabled people are just as capable as complaining about bad service to their friends as the “abled” are. When a friend of mine who was walking on crutches for a few weeks got rude service at a coffeehouse in San Francisco, I stopped going there. When a blind friend mentioned the generous, helpful service she got at another coffeehouse, I made a point of going there, just like I would when anyone gave me a good recommendation for an establishment.

I think that disabled activists are sometimes less vocal than activists for other groups who find themselves marginalized. You don’t see businesses with “no colored” signs on their doors anymore, and if you did, you would probably make a furious complaint to the business owner, town hall, and anyone else who would listen. Yet, you think nothing of walking up a flight of stairs which would be insurmountable to someone in a wheelchair or someone on crutches.

A lot of strides have been made for disabled rights in this country, and there is a growing idea that making accommodations isn’t just legally obligated, it’s also good business, and it’s just plain polite. Apparently that idea hasn’t reached Fort Bragg yet, which is a great pity.

Reading an advice column I won’t bother to name yesterday, I was amused and saddened to note that the old stereotype about massage therapists as sex providers is still alive and well. The person seeking advice wrote a scathing letter about her boyfriend’s “questionable relationship” with a “masseuse,” and the columnist wrote back to assure the girlfriend that obviously her boyfriend was cheating, and she should dump his as soon as possible. (Well, it was a bit more involved than that, but that’s the short story.)

Anyway, it got my blood boiling, as this topic often does, so I thought I would say, as I have said many times, that massage therapists are not sex providers. I don’t know where this great mythology comes from, but it’s extremely frustrating, and it’s really unjust to hardworking therapists who have trained extensively so that they can help their clients.

In the situation discussed in the letter, the boyfriend was trading his advice as a financial planner for massages from a therapist who wanted to set up a business plan. The girlfriend was all aflutter because the boyfriend was meeting the massage therapist at her house, and trading services rather than just buying them, and the letter really illustrated a lot of misconceptions about the massage world (starting, of course, with the idea that massage therapists are all hookers).

For one thing, it’s really common for therapists to work out of their houses. Most spas, you may be surprised to know, do not compensate their therapists very well. This is not, I should add, out of a sense of greed, but because running a spa is expensive. Therapists may net as little as $25 for a massage; the advantage to spa work is that therapists can be assured a fairly steady schedule, and they don’t have to worry about maintaining supplies, doing their laundry, and so forth. The disadvantage is that many spas don’t pay for on-call work, so a therapist may be locked out of work for five or six hours while on a shift without making any money, and of course the pay per massage is low. It’s also not always possible to establish long term relationships with clients, where clients come back frequently for regular work. (I should add that this is not, of course, the case with all spas. Some spas, for example, pay an hourly rate and allow therapists to supplement with tips, and others split fees 50/50, allowing their therapists to make more money. However, it is something to consider when looking for a massage therapist; this is one of the reasons turnover in spas tends to be high, and if you want to find a long-term therapist, you might be better served by finding a private practitioner.)

So, the advantage to working from home, as a therapist, is that your overhead is minimal, because you’re already renting (or owning, if you’re lucky) your home. You also have the advantage of setting your own hours, and once you get a practice established, you tend to get a group of regulars going. A lot of massage schools encourage therapists to start by working at home or doing outcall work, because of the low overhead; another option is to band together with a couple of therapists to rent and share a small workspace.

So, it’s not unusual at all that the girl’s boyfriend should be meeting the massage therapist at her house, rather than a spa. The girlfriend claimed that he could afford spa rates, but maybe he prefers the work of this particular massage therapist, or maybe he is aware of the fact that therapists are sometimes abused by spas, or maybe he’s just into doing trade work.

Many massage therapists are very into trade. It’s actively encouraged by many massage schools; trade a massage series for a promotional brochure design, for example, thereby benefiting the therapist and his or her client. Some massage therapists are also just trade-y kind of people, who think that barter has a value and enjoy working in a barter system. Barter can also allow people to access desired goods and services when they wouldn’t otherwise be able to.

Massage therapists are service providers, just like gynecologists. No one thinks that people go into a career in gynecology because they’re sex crazed, though, and I wonder why this stigma clings to massage therapists so stubbornly, despite educational efforts. Massage is awesome, and it’s something which seems to be growing more and more popular. People really do seem to be recognizing that massage has potential health benefits, and that it’s just enjoyable. It also seems to be growing more acceptable to dedicate part of one’s income to massage. It’s no longer a luxury, but a perfectly reasonable and necessary expense. I think that’s a good thing, personally.

I think that people who don’t know massage therapists don’t quite understand the nature of their work. There’s always some lurking suspicion about happy endings and other such nonsense, and there’s a lack of ability to understand the professional ethics of massage therapists. And that’s a major bummer, because it leads to a lot of confusion. Of course, if we just legalized prostitution, we could get rid of a lot of the confusion, because people could just look hookers up in the phone book when they want sex, and massage therapists when they want massage work, and everyone would be happy.

I’ve been following the story of a surgeon accused of basically killing a patient to harvest his organs with some interest. If you haven’t heard anything about the case, the New York Times has a decent article on it. Basically, the surgeon made some…interesting medical decisions which appear to have been designed to hasten the death of a disabled patient, after discussion about harvesting his organs for a cardiac death transplant (most transplants in the United States are performed after brain death, but cardiac death transplants are possible). It was clear that the patient was going to die anyway, so his ventilator was removed, with consent from his mother, and when he didn’t die immediately, drugs were prescribed. Depending on how you view the case, the drugs were given for comfort, or to try to speed the patient’s death. Either way, he still didn’t die immediately, and his organs turned out to be useless for donation.

This case intrigues me on a number of levels. For one thing, the surgeon hasn’t been convicted yet, so information may come out in the trial to justify his actions. Given that I’m not a medical professional, I am obviously not qualified to comment on the patient’s treatment. But it does raise the specter which organ transplant advocacy organizations have been fighting for years: the idea that people could be killed for their organs. Or simply that surgeons could be a bit, er, hasty.

I’m not surprised that this case is getting a lot of press, since it’s such an easy thing to write a story about. It’s kind of unfortunate, though, because I think it may scare some people off, making them decide they don’t want to donate their organs for fear of a case just like this. And that’s unfortunate, because I think that the bulk of organ harvests in the United States are perfectly legal and well within ethical guidelines. And organizations which promote organ donation here are probably incredibly frustrated that this case has become so high-profile.

The “donated” organs coming from China which have been linked with executed prisoners are far more sketchy, and should be a cause for serious concern, rather than an isolated and as-yet unproved accusation here in the US. And maybe people wouldn’t be turning to a very shady source for organs if we had a more organized donation system in the United States, say an “opt-out” system like they have in many countries. In an opt-out system, it is assumed that everyone consents to organ donation, and people must specifically request that they not be considered for donation if they are opposed to it.

I’m a fan of opt-out systems because I think that a lot of people would be perfectly ok with having their organs donated, but they haven’t explicitly stated that, and as a result their organs go to waste when they die. And these systems greatly increase the supply of organs, making it possible for more people to get them, and I happen to think that this is a good thing. For people who don’t want to donate, it’s generally easy to opt-out.
We aren’t allowed to sell our organs here in the United States, which I think is probably a good thing. We are allowed to freely give them to each other, bypassing transplant queues, which I think is also a good thing. But I think we could avoid awful cases like this one if we made organ donation a mainstream, assumed thing, like vaccinations. And maybe transplant surgeons wouldn’t be faced with situations like this if they knew that the organs their patients need were readily available.

I am curious to see how this case impacts the rate of organ donation in the United States; maybe there will be a decrease, maybe not. If we don’t notice a decline in confidence about organ donation, it will be a testimony to years of patient education on the part of donation advocates.

(This photo was taken by Julie, who kindly uploaded it to her Flickr set and licensed it with Creative Commons. I like sharing! And here’s her blog.)

Readers, I have a pressing and urgent question for you.

I was reading recently that some people do not generate stinky pee when they eat asparagus, or perhaps they are lacking the receptors in their noses to realize that they are generating stinky pee. So I’m putting the question to you: what happens when you eat asparagus and you pee?

I have no idea if my nifty poll will show up in RSS or not, but I guess I’ll find out. Feel free to add comments, especially if you are in the medical community and you can bring your knowledge to bear on this pressing issue. If you “don’t eat asparagus,” start, because it’s one of the most perfect and wonderful vegetables on the Earth.

“You don’t look like you’ve had a lot of dental attention,” he said, tapping one of my molars.

“Yrrch,” I agreed, drooling slightly and wondering if anyone had ever bitten him by accident.

“I’m going to need a peri probe over here,” he muttered.

“Ergh?”

After a bit of poking and prodding which included being gouged in the gums with what felt like a toothpick, he pulled his hands out of my mouth. I’m not really sure what the etiquette is here, I mean do I leave my eyes open and gaze blankly at the ceiling, or do I close them demurely while the dentist plunges around in my mouth? And why do dentists talk to you when you can’t respond?

“Well, I don’t see any problems.”

That’s right, kids, apparently when you don’t go to the dentist for a decade…nothing happens. But seriously. I still think regular dental care is a good idea, and I’m really pleased that nothing is going on in my mouth that shouldn’t be. I also appreciated the fact that the dentist didn’t harass me at all for not going for over a decade. The dentist recommended a cleaning, and he seemed slightly astounded that I didn’t have suppurating ulcers in my mouth or something, but apparently my teeth are a-ok. My father, of course, pointed out that his teeth didn’t bother him until he was 40 when I smugly called him with the news, implying that the best is yet to come.

Not so pleased with the state of dental x-ray technology, however. I feel like x-rays weren’t very pleasant when I was a kid, but perhaps the dentistry industry might have developed, you know, a better system. Apparently that is not the case. The dental assistant took 18 films of my teeth, and I gagged and drooled through pretty much the entire process. Apparently I’m the worst patient she’s ever had; I heard her say it in the hall. I think she might have said that because she thought I was going to vomit during film 17, though. Which I would like to argue was not my fault, since my tongue was trapped under an incredibly sharp piece of x-ray film and I had snot pouring down the back of my throat and I was drooling, and I defy you to not at least gag when that happens.

I would recommend that the American Dental Association consider investing in some research and development to create smaller, padded x-ray films. My mouth feels like it’s been sliced apart by a rabid sushi chef.

Yesterday afternoon, I picked up the phone to make a great personal sacrifice. It’s something that I have been battling for quite some time, and it took immense introspection to finally break down and do it. These kinds of things are such personal decisions that I greatly appreciate the fact that no one pressured me into this sacrifice, or even harassed me. I simply woke up and decided that it needed to happen. Well, actually I woke up last Friday and decided it needed to happen, but there was no power, so that kind of screwed the pooch.

“Hello,” said the chipper receptionist on the other end of the phone. “This is Dr. Carney’s office, how may I help you?”

“Er, yes,” I said. “I, uhm, need to make an appointment? For a dental checkup?”

“Ok, I’d be happy to do that for you,” she said. “Are you a regular patient?”

“Uhm, no, I’m a…new patient?”

“Ok, great,” she said. “We love new patients! Are you having a particular problem you wanted to talk to the doctor about?”

“No, I just haven’t been to the dentist in over a decade, so I thought it was probably time. I know it’s silly, but I really am terrified of dentists. But I know I should forestall any problems before they start.”

This was the point where I expected a long and awkward silence. Followed by being berated for not going to the dentist.

“No problem,” she said cheerfully, without missing a beat. “I’m got an appointment on the 15th, does that sound ok for you?”

I can’t really explain why I haven’t been to the dentist in over 10 years. I understand intellectually that going to the dentist is very important. That dental problems, in addition to being painful, can also cause other health problems. And I also know that the earlier you catch them, the less expensive they are. I can’t even really use lack of insurance as an excuse at this point, because I can well afford the exam fee (and if I couldn’t, I’ll bet my father would pay for it).

I really am just afraid of dentists. I don’t trust them, and I don’t like them. I think all of this stems from a dental experience which went very, very wrong when I was a child. It ultimately required the services of another dentist, who was perfectly nice and gentle but by then it was too late. I kind of feel bad for dentists, because they really do have an undeserved bad rep.

I’m sure that Dr. Carney will be perfectly nice (he’s my father’s dentist, which is why I chose him), and I doubt that he will give me too much grief about allowing over 10 years to elapse between dental appointments, because he’ll be happy I’m getting dental services now. Although he will probably have a comment about my oral piercing, which raises a brief period of debate for me; so I take it out, so that it’s not the first thing he sees? Or do I leave it in? It’s not the kind of thing I would lie about; if I took it out, I would tell him about it, since I think it’s relevant to my dental care, but I also don’t want to get into an ideological argument about whether or not piercings are harmful to the teeth. If I have any skulking dentists reading this, I would appreciate input.

I did draw the line at a tooth cleaning, though; the receptionist gently suggested it and I said I’d stick with a checkup, and again to her credit, she didn’t push it at all. In fact, she was very sweet and totally cool, and that was greatly appreciated. I imagine receptionists for dental offices are carefully chosen because of the intense burden of stigma which dentists bear.

I’m not sure what’s going to happen at my dental appointment. To my knowledge, I don’t have any dental problems, so I’m going to be a bit skeptical if the need for fillings and so forth is pronounced. I imagine that those of us who profess a knuckle-whitening fear of dentists get little notes on our files to encourage the doctor to go gently, in which case perhaps he will ease into things rather than pronouncing my mouth a total mess. My father (who does have a total mess going on in his mouth) says that he’s a good dentist who is generally helpful and informative; I guess I’ll find out.

I view my decision to finally go to the dentist as being akin to kicking a major habit. (Although obviously the psychological agony of, say, quitting smoking is far worse than the tension I experienced when I picked up the phone to call the dentist’s office.) It really is the kind of thing that someone needs to come to on their own; I am well aware of the consequences of lackadaisical dental care, so I have no excuse for not going beyond my own fear and mental block, and I finally overcame that.

Now I have a whole week to fret about what’s going to happen. Rest assured, gentle readers, I will report back on the grisly details of my dental experience, complete with x-rays if there’s anything really awesome going on inside my mouth.